(a) Technical Field
The present inventive concept relates to a display device and a manufacturing method thereof.
(b) Description of the Related Art
A display device generally includes a pixel including a switching element, a display panel provided with display signal lines, a gate driver transmitting a gate signal to a gate line among the display signal lines to turn the switching element in the pixel on/off, a data driver applying a data voltage to a data line, and a signal controller controlling them.
As one of most commonly used flat display devices, a liquid crystal display device includes two display panels where field generating electrodes such as a pixel electrode, a common electrode, and the like are formed, and a liquid crystal display provided between the two display panels. The liquid crystal display generates an electric field in the liquid crystal layer by applying a voltage to the field generating electrodes, determines a direction of liquid crystal molecules of the liquid crystal layer with the electric field, and controls polarization of incident light to thereby display an image. Transmittance of the liquid crystal display may be increased as the liquid crystal molecules are properly controlled.
At least one pixel electrode included in each pixel of the liquid crystal display is connected with a switching element that is connected with display signal lines such as a gate line, a data line, and the like. The switching element is a three-terminal element such as a thin film transistor and the like, and transmits a data voltage to a pixel electrode.
In the liquid crystal display, the pixel electrode generating an electric field to the liquid crystal layer and the common electrode may be provided in one display panel where a switching element is formed. At least one of the pixel electrode and the common electrode of the liquid crystal display may include a plurality of branch electrodes. When an electric field is generated in the liquid crystal layer, an alignment direction of the liquid crystal molecules in the liquid crystal layer is determined by a fringe field generated by branch electrodes.
A driving circuit such as a gate driver and a data driver may be mounted to the display device as an integrated circuit chip, mounted to the display device as a flexible printed circuit film and thus attached to the display device as a tape carrier package (TCP), or mounted on a printed circuit board. However, recently, a data driver that does not require high mobility of a thin film transistor channel has been integrated to a display panel through the same process as the display signal line and the switching element rather than being formed as an additional chip.
Such a gate driver includes a shift register formed of a plurality of dependently connected stages and a plurality of signal lines transmitting a driving signal to the shift register. The plurality of stages include a plurality of thin film transistors and a capacitor. Each stage is connected to a corresponding gate line, and the plurality of stages sequentially output a gate signal to the respective gate lines according to a predetermined order.
A plurality of patterns of the thin film transistor, the pixel electrode, and the common electrode of the display device may be formed through a photolithography process. In the photolithography process, photo-masks are respectively used according to patterns to be patterned in respective exposure processes.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the inventive concept and therefore it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known in this country to a person of ordinary skill in the art.